This invention relates to air-water syringes, and more specifically to fittings for connecting a syringe tip to a hand-piece of an air-water syringe.
Air-water syringes are used by dentists and dental technicians for many dental procedures, such as cleaning debris from a patient's teeth and mouth. The teeth and mouth are cleaned by spraying a stream of water, air or a combination of water and air from the syringe. A typical air-water syringe has a hand-piece and a syringe tip releasably attached to the hand-piece.
Many dentists use disposable syringe tips to avoid spreading infectious diseases from one patient to another. A typical disposable air-water syringe tip has discrete air and water passageways for communication with air and water passageways of the hand-piece.
Disposable tips are typically received in a connector which is adapted to connect the tip to the hand-piece. The tips are held in place by turning the connector which includes one or more parts which clamp down on the tube. These connectors have a disadvantage in that the tip may not be securely held in the hand-piece if the connector is not adequately screwed onto the hand-piece. This may result in leakage from between the hand-piece and tip or the tip being ejected into the patient's mouth which could result in injury to the patient. Furthermore, the time required to loosen the connector, replace the tip and reattach and tighten the connector is significant considering these steps are repeated several times a day.
Quick-connect type fittings which are presently available eliminate the need for tightening a connector, these fittings, however, require specially formed disposable tips which are expensive to manufacture. These fittings typically include many parts including springs which can wear over time thus increasing the chances of ejecting a tip into a patient's mouth.
Accordingly, there is a need for a quick-connect fitting for connecting a dental syringe tip to a dental syringe hand-piece which is simple to use, reliable and relatively inexpensive to manufacture, and can be used with different types of syringe tips.